


Love and War and Snow

by iamfitzwilliamdarcy



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Reg is mostly background but he gets a tag lol, but there is a christmas party, there's no actual snow in this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-17
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:21:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25326058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iamfitzwilliamdarcy/pseuds/iamfitzwilliamdarcy
Summary: Snippets, in no particular age-order, featuring Sirius, his parents, and select Gilmore Girls quotes
Comments: 6
Kudos: 28





	Love and War and Snow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [izzythehutt](https://archiveofourown.org/users/izzythehutt/gifts).



> In the continuing tradition of me, I am Extremely Late with birthday fics, but!!! Happy (late) birthday Izzy who, when we first started chatting about the Blacks, mentioned Lorelai was a genderbent, modern Sirius. So I ran with that, clearly.

_RICHARD: You owe my daughter an apology.  
_ _STRAUB: An apology, that's rich.  
_ _RICHARD: How dare you?! [grabbing Straub] How dare you?!  
_ _EMILY: Richard what are you doing?  
_ _RICHARD: How dare you come into my house and insult my daughter!_

“Yes, yes,” Orion interrupted Mrs. Nott’s tirade, impatiently. “I quite understand, thank you.” 

Mrs. Nott looked quite put out that he had dared to interrupt her, her hands still fluttering uselessly over her son’s broad shoulders. Orion used the momentary silence brought by Mrs. Nott’s indignation at being told, as it were, to shut up, to study his own son. 

Sirius, though he’d grown several inches during his first year away at Hogwarts, still could not quite reach the floor from where he sat, slouched, of course, on the couch, and so his legs swung back and forth, kicking the baseline and looking far more childish than he had any right. He could’ve scuffed the floor if he really stretched, but he looked far more like he’d like to curl up then and there. 

His face, just starting to shed its baby fat, was redder than Orion had had occasion to see it, marred with a still-bleeding cut and bruised cheek. He refused to look at any of them, staring sullenly out the window instead. 

He was not, in short, acting like the arrogant, self-assured twelve-year old Orion was used to reckoning with. 

“Well,” Orion pressed him, “Do you have anything to say?” 

Sirius only shook his head, still facing away.

“Of course he hasn’t, has he,” Mrs. Nott snapped, coming back to life. “What can he say, picking fights like this?”

Orion spared her a dismissive look. “Who’s to say he started this?” 

“He resorted to his fists!” Mrs. Nott cried, outraged. “Like a common Muggle!”

“Honestly, woman,” Orion said, turning to her, and waving his hand. “What do you want from me? They’re boys, fighting! Juvenile, perhaps, but would we really be discussing this further if my twelve-year-old hadn’t out-duelled your son who is, we presume, an OWL level student. Perhaps you should be contacting the Headmaster instead to lodge a complaint about the clearly subpar education commencing in his halls.”

Her hand leapt to her chest as the Nott boy looked away, sneering. Orion glanced again at Sirius, who would, ordinarily, have been unseemingly amused by such a display. He was still not looking at them. 

“If that’s all then,” Orion said calmly, turning back to Mrs. Nott.

“It is not,” Mrs. Nott said, furiously, and Orion sighed. The hysterics women could work themselves into, over a simple schoolboy brawl! He could feel an ache begin to form in his head and was torn between fervent gladness that Walburga was not here to further fan the Nott woman’s flames and desire for her to take his place in dealing with the situation. 

“I’ve heard what you’ve had to say,” Orion said. “And I think that’s enough.”

Mrs. Nott opened her mouth again, no doubt to cry out some other melodramatic observation, as if that might sway Orion further, but he turned on her soundly and faced her husband instead.

“Well,” he said roughly. “Haven’t you anything to say?”

Mr. Nott met his gaze steadily. “Nothing you’ll appreciate.”

Orion sneered. “I see. Then, I suppose, that really is all, as I don’t think I can stand to listen to another moment of your wife’s hysterics. If you’d be so kind as to--,”

“He was a guest in our home,” Mr. Nott said. “And he attacked my son, resorted to Muggle dueling when he’d been bested. What kind of man are you raising, Orion?”

Orion scowled, but Mr. Nott pressed on, his face darkening, before Orion could protest. “You know, I’d beat my boy--” he gestured to his son on the couch--”black and blue and chain him to the house before I let him associate with the filth _your_ son now calls friends.”

Sirius’ lips pressed together, his chin dimpling. He would not cry, Orion knew. While emotional and passionate, his boy, by nature, wasn’t much of a crier, even had he not been taught better. That he even had to fight tears in the first place, much less in front of an audience, told Orion he was truly upset. 

And he was, after all, still only a child. 

“What are you getting at, Nott?” Orion interrupted, voice studiously bored. 

Nott sneered back. “Only that who we choose to associate with reflects on us. A nasty boy—,” he’d turned to speak directly to Sirius, and it occurred to Orion that the boy had been alone with the Notts before they returned him home. How much of a tirade has he already been subjected to? 

“—always have been, haven’t you? Flaunting your treachery, no better than a Mudblood, if you ask—“

“How dare you?” Orion spoke so dangerously quiet it stopped Nott in his tracks. His voice rose as he did, repeating,, “how dare you?” He drew his wand and pointed it directly at Nott, “How dare you come into my home and insult my son?”

Mrs. Nott shrieked, and Mr. Nott said, “Orion, really, get a hold of yourself, man!” 

“Get out of my house,” Orion snarled, gesturing towards the foyer. Kreacher appeared to aid in the dismissal, but Mr. Nott, also furious, shouted “We’re leaving!” and stormed away, shepherding his hysterical wife and useless son ahead of him. 

Orion glanced at Sirius, who had curled onto himself, and sighed. He marched away to his study, letting the boy have a moment. 

It was some hours later that Sirius came into his study.

“What have I told you about knocking?” Orion asked, barely glancing up from the sums of money to allocate to the family ahead of the holidays. 

Sirius let out a deep sigh that wasn’t an apology, but got Orion to lift his head. He was looking livelier than earlier, but still flushed red as if embarrassed. No one, Orion noted, had tended to his face either.

It was rare, though, that Orion was kept waiting when Sirius had something he was bursting to say. Now, though, he scuffed a toe across the carpet until Orion, annoyed, said, “Out with it.” 

Sirius took another deep breath and let it out in a whoosh, then said, hurriedly, “Thank you for sticking up for me earlier with Mr. Nott and all.”

Orion blinked at him, startled. “Sirius,” he said sternly. “My _son_ was being attacked, our _family name_ was being attacked. I will not stand for that, under any circumstances. Do you understand?”

Sirius fidgeted a little, then said, “Only I was Sorted into Gryffindor and all, so I--”

“Your Sorting was...unfortunate,” Orion interrupted. “But it makes you no less a Black. You would do well to remember that and comport yourself accordingly.” He turned back to his numbers, his reassurance given, and said, “If that’s all, have Kreacher tend to your face.” 

****************

 _(Lorelai walks into her old bedroom, grabs her coat off the bed, and starts to climb out the window when Richard walks in.)  
_ _RICHARD: Lorelai, your mother wants to know if. . .  
_ _LORELAI: Hi daddy. Okay, I know this is bad. And I know this probably brings back all the horrible aspects of my childhood life for you. And see, I'm really sorry that we fought last week, and I'm really sorry that you're so disappointed in me, and I really wish there was something I can do to fix that, but there probably isn't and I can accept that because I am an adult now and I am proud of who I have become. But I am begging you, please, please do not make me go back down there because that guy is boring.  
_ _RICHARD: Emily, she's not up here!_  
LORELAI: Thank you Daddy.

Sirius wasn’t the only one missing from the Christmas party that year--the children had long since outgrown needing nannies to tend to them or put them to bed early in the evening, but it could only be expected that, still youthful, they would wander off to discuss their own affairs, leaving their parents to the discussions of marriages and children, finances and politics. 

Sirius, however, was the only one not with the small gaggle of teenagers, a fact Orion was aware of and made _more_ aware of when his wife stole him away from discussing the finer matters of the repairs being done to the Blacks’ winter home with Cygnus and Druella and a decidedly _amused_ Alphard to _fret_ at him about his missing son. 

It was his wife’s insistence, Regulus’ furtive glances from his own place with the other boys, and the fact that Sirius had tried to sneak out earlier before the festivities even began that found Orion slipping away from the party to seek the boy out. What Walburga thought he could _do_ if Sirius weren’t there, if he’d truly given the party the slip, he wasn’t sure, and it seemed unwise, to him, to draw attention to the fact. Especially not at a party Orion’s own father was attending. 

Acturus didn’t seem to notice him leaving, but it wasn’t long before the patriarch would look for him. 

“Sirius!” Orion called along the staircase--his voice would carry ahead of him, but the music and chatter from downstairs would drown it out to any eavesdropping partygoers.

He had expected to have to climb all the way to Sirius’ room, but the ajar door to his study gave him pause. He quickened his pace, and pushed the door further open, saying, “Sirius, your mother is looking for you.”

The boy looked up from where he lounged on the sofa near the drink cart, wide-eyed. Just turned sixteen, he still wasn’t as tall as Orion, though he’d spread out admirably across the sofa, a leg even thrown to hook over the back. His hair, trimmed since coming home, though still a shade too long--a compromise hard-earned from his mother--flopped into his eyes, and, while he still wore his dress robes, he looked rumpled and untidy. 

He also had a glass of Orion’s brandy in his hand. Orion eyed it, but before he could comment, the boy said, “Dad _please_ don’t make me go back down there. They’re so _boring_ . And I won’t like whatever girl she wants me to _dance_ with.”

“And let you drink all my brandy?” Orion asked, raising an eyebrow. He didn’t even know if there was a young lady Walburga had her claws in to dispute _that_ point. 

Sirius twisted his mouth at the drink. “It’ll keep me out of trouble,” he offered helpfully. 

“Will it,” Orion said dryly. 

“You know I’ll just end up ruining it for her,” Sirius said, plunking his head back on the sofa’s arm. As dramatic as the she he referenced. 

They were both still thinking, Orion supposed, of the disastrous plans for Sirius’ sixteenth birthday--where he’d shouted down any of Walburga’s suggestions for throwing him a celebration and vetoed an entire guest list because they didn’t include the boys he called friends until she’d given up completely and shouted back. Then, when they had taken him and his brother out of school for a dinner celebration, he had been moody and barely eaten or spoken to them at all. 

Orion didn’t quite know what his wife _expected_ from Sirius, but her high hopes had been utterly dashed. It had not occurred to Orion the boy felt, perhaps, guilty about it when he was so often too concerned with being _righteous_. 

Heels on the stairs brought Orion back to the present. Sirius froze on the couch, not even the ice in his glass clinking, and gave Orion a pleading look. 

“I’ll be down in a minute, Walburga,” he called carelessly over his shoulder. “Go back to the party.”

The footsteps paused on the stairwell, but then turned around, though they sounded distinctly more annoyed. Orion frowned, anticipating their whispered conversation walking between guests that was to follow. 

Sirius, however, visibly relaxed at the sound of her retreating steps, until Orion pulled his watch out of his pocket. “I expect you have an hour before your grandfather decides to commandeer _this_ study for brandy and cards.” It was Arcturus’ old study, and, of course, his right, but the smoking room was far more appropriate for guests, Orion felt. 

(Perhaps Arcturus anticipated how much Orion wanted to leave parties when they reached that point and was heading him off.) 

Sirius smiled at him, an honest smile like Orion hadn’t seen in some years--not tinged with sarcasm or bitterness or even mischief--and said, “Thanks, Dad.”

“You won’t be thanking me if you drink my good brandy,” Orion warned.

Sirius frowned down at his glass. “I thought this _was_ your good brandy.”

Orion laughed. “That,” he said, “was an insulting present from Abraxas Malfoy to my father.”

“Who gifted it to you,” Sirius said, sounding almost disgusted. He threw back the last of it in one swallow and leaned over to pour himself more.

“Stay in the house,” Orion added, “And don’t drink too much of that.”

Sirius raised his glass in salute, Orion already on his way back to the Christmas party where he pacified his wife with an excuse about the boy being perfectly alright but in need of a lie down, headache, you see, from too much champagne. 

****************

_LORELAI: I may never get married; I may be a free spirit my whole life! Or fall in love with a separated Catholic guy like Katherine Hepburn and then not get to go to his funeral when he dies._

Regulus sidled into Orion’s office as the sound of raised voices followed him up the stairs. Orion hardly glanced up as he offered Regulus the section of the _Prophet_ he was finished with. Regulus accepted it, despite the heavy book tucked under his arm.

“What is it this time?” Orion asked, eyes still on the paper.

Regulus seated himself on the sofa opposite Orion’s chair and answered, flushing a little, “I think marriage.”

That got Orion’s attention. He raised his head and repeated, “Marriage? The boy’s not even 15.”

Regulus nodded solemnly in agreement. Then added, “I think it started over a joke Sirius made about eloping.” Orion sighed, exasperated. When would Walburga stop letting him needle her like that? She fell for it every time! “And then Mother told him she wouldn’t give him his wedding present if he _did_ elope and now he’s insulted.” 

The voices moved closer, but they didn’t sound as angry as Orion had first assumed. Walburga certainly sounded as _exasperated_ as Orion felt, and Sirius sounded far more like he was enjoying himself than actually angry. 

“I’m not telling you!” Walburga was insisting, her voice floating closer. They were nearing the top of the stairs near Orion’s study. “You’ll have to wait until you’re married--”

“I may never get married!” Sirius burst out. “I might be a free spirit my whole life! Unattached, free agent!”

Orion rolled his eyes heavenwards at the theatrics, though it was almost nice to hear the two sparring. Sirius had been moodily quiet since coming home for summer break a month prior, though he often made his displeasure at being home known by purposefully stomping around his room, right over Orion’s head. 

Orion would hardly have believed that one adolescent boy’s mood could have such an impact on an entire household, but he had seen it played so frequently in during Sirius’ holidays that he could attest to it. Orion’s own father, he supposed, would accuse him of _allowing_ Sirius’ mood to run the household, but there was little Orion could do about _feelings_. 

“Oh don’t be dramatic,” Walburga snapped back. Orion would intervene if he genuinely thought Sirius was stepping out of line, but Walburgua could generally handle the boy well on her own, and he suspected his wife rather enjoyed these spats. “Of course you’ll get married.”

“I won’t!” Sirius insisted. “Maybe I’ll fall in love with a divorced Catholic like Katharine Hepburn and not be able to go to her funeral when she dies!”

The door had not latched when Regulus shut it, and through partial opening, Orion could see where his wife had come to a stop, spluttering as she tried to understand.

“Why,” Walburga finally got out, “do you think your father or I would ever find you a _divorcée_ to marry! The scandal of it, honestly, Sirius Orion, where do you get these ideas? And _who_ in Merlin’s name is _Katharine Hepburn_?” 

Orion cast a questioning look at Regulus, whose own brow was furrowed in confusion. No answer there. 

There was an elongated pause in which, Orion thought, Sirius tried to adjust to his mis-step. “I--uh,” he mumbled. “No one _you’d_ know.”

“You can’t marry her,” Walburga forbade immediately.

“Mum!” Sirius exclaimed. “She’s ancient now! And anyway, she’s an American.”

“How do you know her then?” Walburga asked, still suspicious. “I want you to stop seeing her.”

“I’m not--Mum, she’s an _actress_ .” It was Sirius’ turn to sound exasperated. “I’ve never _met_ her.”

“Not an actress I’ve ever heard of,” Walburga sniffed. “She must not be very good.”

“Just because you haven’t heard of her doesn’t mean she’s not good,” Sirius huffed back. 

Walburga paused, then said, “Perhaps you and I will see her in a show, then, if she’s so talented.”

The air went still, and Orion chanced another look at Regulus, who staring intently at his book. It, alas, did not appear to hold answer of just _who_ Katharine Hepburn.

Finally, shiftily, Sirius said, “You can’t.”

“And why not?” Walburga demanded. 

“She’s a Muggle actress, Mum!” Sirius burst out. “In, you know, _movies_.”

“I do not know!” Walburga said sharply. She breathed heavily for several long moments as Orion waited to see what kind of rebuke she would muster. Regulus was flushed behind his book, brow pinched. Then, Walburga said, dignified, “You will not speak of such _inappropriate_ matters in this home, Sirius Orion.”

Orion could not see his son, but he could certainly picture the angry red flush rising to his cheeks as he opened his mouth to answer furiously back. Why he _always_ felt the need to bring up _Muggle_ things around them, Orion never understood. The poor influence of his son’s classmate’s interests on Sirius’ sense of culture was made more apparent each day. 

“Now wash up for dinner,” Walburga insisted, before Sirius could fire back. She rapped on Orion’s door, and said to them, “Kreacher will be serving dinner in ten minutes, as he has done for us for decades.”

Regulus hopped up at the passive-aggressive scolding; Orion followed more slowly, unwilling to appear bossed around. Sirius was still in the hallway, looking not at all ashamed of himself, even when he realized his father had heard the whole conversation.

“So,” he said, bobbing around at Orion’s shoulder as they descended the stairs. “Do _you_ know what Mum will get me for my wedding?”


End file.
